


Fire, Shining Cruelty

by Espereth



Category: Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Genre: Baby Dragon, Community: skyrimkinkmeme, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-30
Updated: 2014-01-30
Packaged: 2018-01-10 14:02:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1160536
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Espereth/pseuds/Espereth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Dragonborn summons Odahviing for a surprising task.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fire, Shining Cruelty

**Author's Note:**

> Prompted on the kinkmeme http://skyrimkinkmeme.livejournal.com/4295.html?thread=7434695#t7434695

From his resting place in the high peaks of the North, Odahviing heard his own name called in need, and stirred. The Dovahkiin summoned, and Odahviing came. As was their pact. 

Odahviing, the snow-winged hunter, wheeled low over the plains of the Rift, watching the ground change from snowy forest to the dry red-brown of tundra. His Dovahkiin, the human with the Voice of thunder, called his name again. 

In irritation, Odahviing sighed inwardly. _Patience, Dovahkiin_ , he thought. _Your Dovah comes_.

He banked, turned, dipped, scanning for the small figure of the mortal who had bound him in their strange friendship. The shout had echoed as though against rock, and sure enough, there was the human with his back against a rocky outcrop. His tawny fur armor made him hard to spot against the brown and gold landscape of the tundra, but now Odahviing saw him, amber-eyed and olive skinned, black hair shining in the early sun. His breath puffed quickly into the clear dawn air, and he was sweating, a hand clutched to bloodied ribs; but no enemy was to be seen.

Odahviing saw the human draw a breath to Shout for him again, and landed in front of him.

"I am here, Dovahkiin," he said. "Why have you summoned me?" 

The Dovahkiin cast his gaze west, and Odahviing followed his eyes. Then he caught the glimmer of sun on scales and saw a little bronze-scaled dragon, circling in the air a mile away. 

The other dragon was young, barely a year old, still growing. The smaller creature saw Odahviing and at once began to show off. He rolled in the air, displaying the shining pale green scales of his underbelly; then he swooped and lit a tall pine on fire in a display of prowess. He screeched, a high-pitched sound from his barely developed Voice. Odahviing's deep rumble of a laugh sounded in disbelief. 

He walked to his mortal on the points of his wings.

"Dovahkiin! You called me for that - a little one, the size of your horse? What has happened to you?" he said, flicking out his tongue to smell-taste the mortal's copper tinged blood.

"He caught me sleeping," said the mortal, eyes narrowing in annoyance. Shivering and still holding his ribs he muttered a phrase that caused his palm to glow red, and groaned in pain as his flesh and bones knitted under his own fingers. 

"I will bring him to the ground," Odahviing promised. "I will slice his belly like a gutted fish, and you shall consume his soul." He draped a protective wing over his Dovahkiin. "And then I will roast the mudcrabs in the lake for you, lest they overwhelm you in your travels."

"I didn't call you to kill him," said the Dovahkiin, flicking blood off his hands and wiping them on his fur trousers. His shirt was ruined, and he stripped it off, his bare brown chest still sticky with sweat and blood. Across his ribs where the wound had been, there was now a delicate line of new, pink skin. "He's a hatchling, yes?"

Odahviing chuckled. "Nothing but a baby." He looked at the bronze dragon, who had apparently been distracted from the Dovahkiin by some wild goats not far away. He landed on the rocky ground, clumsy on land, yet to master the art of walking on the joints of his wings. He stumbled as he terrorised the goats, screeching at them to send them all a-scatter, leaping and panicking. Then the little bronze launched gleefully into the air to chase them, scorching their heels with a blast of flame.

"I want you to talk to him. He might be young enough. Just... just tell him to leave the towns alone, will you? I might be the only one who can end him, but any guard post could bring him down. And sooner or later, they will." 

"This is too much," said Odahviing, shaking in full laughter. "My Dovahkiin. Eater of souls, slayer of ancient foes... protector of hatchlings!"

"Just do it, Odahviing," said the human. "I don't want to kill if I don't have to." 

"As you wish, my Dovahkiin," said Odahviing, and folding his wings against his back, he leapt into the air. 

Aloft, he spread his wings and soared. "Dovah!" he called. "Little Dovah. Come here and tell me your name."

The bronze looked up, swallowed a mouthful of goat, then took to the air ignoring him. He landed in a lake, sending water arcing into the cold dawn. The sun shone on his scales as he splashed. He waited for Odahviing to get close, then launched himself into the sky, screeching and spiralling. 

He was fast, and Odahviing was old; he had no patience for such games.

"Command him to land," Odahviing called, and the Dovahkiin Shouted: "Joor.. Zah Frul!"

Flailing in terror the little dragon plummeted. He dropped to the surface of a plateau, not far from the Dovahkiin's outcrop, and thrashed about in a powerless rage. Odahviing watched, recalling the time the Dovahkiin had used that Shout on him - back when they were enemies. 

Only then, for that brief moment, had Odahviing the snow-winged hunter known mortality; but he had never forgotten it. The human had stripped from him the power of flight, and bound him to the earth. To suffer such shame had been previously unthinkable, and yet, still more humiliation had followed as his head was bolted in place like a collared hound, or a herdbeast yoked to a plough; his powerful body made helpless by human will and ingenuity. 

Odahviing had never truly forgiven the Dovahkiin for that. Although they were allies, now, Odahviing would always know that if he chose, the human could subjugate him, force him to the earth and bind him there.

As he had now done to the little bronze dragon. 

Finding himself unable to take flight, the bronze staggered on his wing-joints as Odahviing approached him. He tried to roar, but the undeveloped sound came out as a squawk, and then a hiss.

"Calm yourself, young Dovah," Odahviing boomed at him. "Listen and you will not be harmed."

"What have you done to me?" the bronze demanded. 

"I have done nothing at all, little Dovah," Odahviing told him. "It is the human who has bound you."

The bronze dragon hissed with rage. "We are Dov-rha! We must fly!" His small body shook all over as Odahviing came closer. "Am... am I to die?"

"Hush," said Odahviing. "Behave yourself, and you will live. Now. What are you called?"

"I am Yolviinax!" he said fiercely, flaring up with a burst of pride. "I am fire, and shining cruelty." He snarled, showing sharp little teeth. "And I would rather die than be bound."

Odahviing bared his own teeth in return, a gaping grin showing that he could fit the smaller dragon's head and forequarters in his mouth with room to spare. "Greetings, Yolviinax," he said, and the smaller dragon stared in unwilling awe. Then he shook his head.

"I am mighty!" Yolviinax announced, and rearing onto his hindquarters, he scorched the earth between them. Odahviing only laughed, withstanding the heat with scales toughened through millennia.

"Perhaps some day, little Dovah," he said. "Some day far in the future. But for now, you are in danger."

"I am danger!" the dragon retorted. "I bring death! Mortals tremble before me, and hide in their stone shelters. I burn all before me, I -"

The human, having climbed the plateau to join the two dragons, now grew tired of the bronze dragon's rant. He looked at the small Dovah. 

"Fus... Ro Dah!" The Shout echoed through the valley. Yolviinax was upended, and head over tail, he tumbled and rolled down the slope of the plateau, coming to a stop dazed and shaking his shining bronze head.

Still bound by Dragonrend, Yolviinax's body lashed in a rage. His tail thumped, sending dust flying. One wing snagged and tore on a sharp rock. His mouth was bloodied from his tumble, and the scales of his bronze flank were scraped raw. Still he could not take flight, so he scrambled to his feet and set fire to all the scrub he could reach. 

Odahviing and the Dovahkiin waited until it had burned out to move towards him.

"Do you not know the tale of the Dovahkiin, little one?" Odahviing said, not unkindly, as the small dragon panted and breathed, spent, his sides heaving like a frightened horse.

"That is a story," said Yolviinax. 

"It is. It is also truth," Odahviing said. "This is the Dovahkiin, the Soul-Eater, slayer of Alduin; of he who would have mastered all of us." 

Yolviinax stared, his jewel eyes narrowed in disbelief.

"It is he who binds you to the ground as we speak; it is he who summoned me; and it is he who sent you tumbling down that hill with the force of his Voice. He has the soul of a Dovah."

"That little thing?" The hatchling snorted. "I shall lift him with my claws, soar into the sky, and drop him! I will see the innards of his cracked skull, and ... " he paused, unable to think of a suitable addition to his threat. 

"And?" said Odahviing, amused.

"And they will be delicious!" Yolviinax stumbled towards the human, and drawing a breath, made his first real roar, bellowing all of his rage and aggression into the mortal's face. 

The Dovahkiin squinted into the blast of sound, withstanding it patiently, then wiped flecks of spit from his skin when it was over. He looked at Odahviing, who was shaking with laughter.

"Perhaps I was mistaken," said the human. "This small one is too stupid to spare."

Odahviing nodded his assent. "You speak truth, Dovahkiin. He is foolhardy, and cannot see sense. If you would eat his soul, I will not oppose you."

Yolviinax went quiet. "Eat... my soul?" 

Odahviing nodded his heavy head. "Every Shout voiced by the Dovahkiin is born of the souls of our kind. Our deepest essence is but a source of his power. He can end us forever, if he chooses."

"And you aid him?" Yolviinax said, his voice accusing.

Odahviing sighed. "Yes, young one, I aid him. But that story is a longer one than you would listen to, I think."

"Can't we kill him?"

"Many have tried," Odahviing said. "And he has slain them all. Alduin among them. As I told you - he has the soul of a Dovah."

The Dovahkiin now approached, and Odahviing was amused to see the small bronze dragon tremble. 

"I have no reason to take your soul, Yolviinax," the human said, "so long as you leave my kind to themselves. Let me see this..." He lifted the hatchling's wing and laid a gentle hand on his bloodied flank. The hatchling twitched, but did not fight.

"Good," said the Dovahkiin, and a healing spell, infused with a soft, calming light, surged through Yolviinax's small, dust-smeared body. 

Yolviinax settled on his haunches, his head bobbing, and the human scratched his neck. "There you go, mighty Yolviinax," he said, smiling. 

"I will kill you when your spell wears off," said Yolviinax idly, and arched into the touch with a yawn.

"It would be a shame if you were to attack me," said the Dovahkiin, and kept scratching. "Do you not want to live to be as old and powerful as Odahviing?"

"I will be older," said Yolviinax at once, "and more powerful." A hind leg twitched as the Dovahkiin's hand moved on his neck.

Odahviing rumbled a laugh. "Then listen well, hatchling," he said, "and I will tell you how..."


End file.
